


Quiet

by evilwriter37



Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Mouth Sewn Shut, psychological mutism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-10
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-02-01 04:57:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21387160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilwriter37/pseuds/evilwriter37
Summary: Grimmel sews Ruffnut's mouth shut as a lesson to keep quiet.
Relationships: Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III & Ruffnut Thorston
Comments: 7
Kudos: 44





	Quiet

“Will you be quiet?!” Grimmel shouted, snapping his charcoal in half. 

“Nah,” Ruffnut said, leaning against the bars of her cell. “I don’t know what that word means.”

“That is it!” Grimmel turned, strode over. He was unlocking the cell, and Ruffnut looked down, tried not to smile, glad that her plan had worked. Grimmel was setting her free because he couldn’t stand how annoying she was. 

Grimmel grabbed her by the arm, threw her towards the other warlords, who took her in a firm grip. What was happening? Was he not letting her go?

“I’m letting you go after you’ve learned your lesson.” Grimmel was now rummaging through a chest.

“Learned my lesson?” Ruffnut asked. That didn’t sound good at all. 

“Yes. You need to learn to be quiet in front of your betters.” He came back from the chest, a needle and thread in hand. Ruffnut’s eyes went big, a horrible idea coming to mind. But no, he wouldn’t do that to her. He couldn’t possibly-

“Hold her face still,” Grimmel ordered.

“No!” Ruffnut shrieked, now realizing that yes, he was going to do exactly what she’d thought of. “No, no!”

Grimmel approached her as her jaw was taken in a large hand. Ruffnut opened her mouth, hoping that that would keep Grimmel from doing this.

It didn’t. The needle poked through her bottom lip, and she screamed. It didn’t matter that her mouth was open, as the needle was going through her upper lip now from the bottom, pulling the string through, closing her mouth over her scream. Ruffnut struggled, tried frantically to get out of the hands of the warlords, but they held her firmly.

“You must stay still,” Grimmel told her. “Wouldn’t want me to mess up, now would you?”

Ruffnut didn’t think it mattered. This was already so painful, and he’d just started. She screamed through her closed mouth as he pierced her upper lip, pulled the thread through to her bottom one, pierced that. It went on and on like that. She was screaming as much as she could through her closed mouth, struggling terribly. The pain was making her cry, and she didn’t like that, didn’t like crying in front of an enemy. 

It seemed like forever before Grimmel was tying off the thread and cutting it. Then the warlords were shoving her away, towards a baby Scuttleclaw that Grimmel was letting out of its cage. Blood dripped and trickled from her mouth.

Grimmel smiled at her. “See? Quiet.” He opened the cell to allow the Scuttleclaw out. “Now go. Get out of my sight.”

Ruffnut was quick to leave, not wanting more pain to befall her. As she flew back towards the base camp she gingerly touched her lips, felt at the thread. She wanted to retch in sheer horror but couldn’t, was forced to swallow it back. There was now blood on her fingers. 

Ruffnut thought of how she would be received at the base. She’d wanted to come in triumphantly, say proudly that she’d saved herself, but she hadn’t, had she? She’d still been hurt. She’d still had…  _ this  _ happen to her. It was horrible, so horrible. How would her friends react?

The cliffs of their base came into view, the waterfalls, the green and the buildings. Ruffnut saw her friends gathered in a clearing on a cliff, landed there.

“Ruff, you’re back!” Hiccup cried upon seeing her. He went in for a hug when she dismounted the Scuttleclaw, but stopped, horror taking on his features, his eyes going wide, his jaw slack. “Ruffnut? Oh. Oh dear gods. Look what he’s done to you.” He carefully touched her cheek. “I’m… I’m so sorry. We should have gone to get you. This is all my fault.”

Ruffnut wanted to tell him that it wasn’t his fault, that it was her own stupid fault, but she couldn’t. 

Her friends had gathered around her now at her return and Hiccup’s words, all trying to get a look. Fishlegs ran off after, face green, probably going to vomit. Ruffnut didn’t blame him. The stitches through her mouth probably looked absolutely horrible. 

“This is my fault.” Hiccup shook his head, pulled at his hair with one hand. “This is all my fault. Ruff, I’m so sorry. Let’s get you to Gothi.”

Gothi was luckily easy to find. Ruffnut didn’t go with her friends, just waited for them to come back with the sage. She didn’t want anyone else seeing her like this. Tuffnut stayed by her, rubbing her back, though she hardly felt it through her armor.

“I’m sorry, Ruff,” he said. “I’m so, so sorry. I’m an idiot for not looking for you.”

Ruffnut wanted to scream. It was no one’s fault but her own. Grimmel had made that quite clear. She perked up when Gothi came back, but then realized this was going to hurt. She had to go through pain to be able to talk again.

Gothi had Ruffnut sit, and she drew a small knife, began very carefully cutting away at the stitches. Ruffnut was panting through her mouth once they were all cut, amazed that she could open it again.

But then came the painful part of pulling out the thread. Ruffnut stayed still, tried not to make a sound like she had with the stitching, but she whimpered and cried.

“Ruffnut.” Hiccup put a hand on her shoulder once it was over and she was holding a cloth to her bleeding mouth. “I’m so sorry to ask this, but were you followed?”

“I-I don’t know,” Ruffnut answered, distressed. “I didn’t look back. I was just thinking of how he told me to be quiet.” There were tears falling now. “He just wanted me to be quiet. Why didn’t I listen?”

“Sh, Ruff, it’s okay.” Hiccup was looking to the horizon now, searching for ships. “You’ll be okay.”

  
  


Ruffnut went mute after that day. She’d been told to be quiet, and so she would be. She tried to talk, but she couldn’t. There was no point. Words would just get her hurt. She knew that too well.

People tried to get her to talk: her mother, her brother, her friends. Gothi didn’t. Gothi sat beside her in silence, in understanding. Ruffnut understood her now, wasn’t frustrated by her mutism. Maybe Gothi had been born with it, or maybe something had happened, but Ruffnut could respect that part of her a lot better now. 

It was hard after the dragons left. Tuffnut got mad at her sometimes, felt like she wasn’t sad about Barf and Belch and everything they’d lost. But she was. She was terribly sad. She just couldn’t open her mouth and tell him. And her writing was no good, her words not coming out correctly, the spelling not right. No, she would just keep her writing to herself, not show it to anyone else.

Gothi taught Ruffnut the symbols that she wrote in and the language she spoke with her hands. Ruffnut was frustrated at first with learning all these new things, but she got the hang of it. Tuffnut and her friends learned these languages too, wanting to understand her again.

So, as time went on, Ruffnut was okay with not talking. She didn’t need to. She wouldn’t do it. No one was going to make her.

She dutifully stayed quiet like Grimmel had told her to. 


End file.
